Freedom from the Ego

Question: I have been told that Eastern wisdoms teach people how to restrict their egos, their desires, to free themselves from suffering, is this true? Do Eastern techniques effect a person so that their egoistic desires diminish until eventually they are united with the One, with the non-local? Answer: rnThe most effective way to become free from the grip of the ego is to directly experience that non-local reality, or the “One” as you call it. So it’s not that you try to restrict your ego in order to experience your true Self; you experience your true Self first, and that is what liberates you from identification with the ego. You have to step outside the realm of the ego completely to extricate yourself from it. Any techniques that are limited to feelings, imagination, intellectual understanding, or will power that aim to free you from the ego, are all still within the field of the ego, and therefore those mental components do not have the ability to transform the very basis of one’s identity beyond the ego. rnLove,rnDeepak